Commentary by Michael Wade on Leadership, Ethics, Management, and Life

Tuesday, September 09, 2008

Paradox of Diversity

Oren Harari takes on the paradox of diversity in this post and in this one. An excerpt:By the way, I recognize, like the reader, that I am playing around with a political Pandora’s box, and that’s why I’m moving on to other subjects starting next week! But before I do, consider one last thought: I suspect that a team that has high-talent members with unconventionally diverse styles and mental models and a common commitment to audacious goals would be more likely to succeed than a team that simply fits conventional definitions of "diversity". Steve Jobs, in describing the early Macintosh breakthroughs, said: "I think part of what made Macintosh great was that the people working on it were musicians, and poets, and artists, and zoologists, and historians who also happened to be the best computer scientists in the world."